"Classifieds (for sale or wanted adds) and commercial postings are not allowed..."
If announcements of workshops were not appropriate, how would we ever know about upcoming workshops? As someone else mentioned, there is even a section here for workshop information. Thanks for the workshop notice Michael.
Coming at this from an entirely selfish, and perhaps even childish, perspective. I find it a bit hard to swallow that the many hours I have spent witing and maintaining the forum software for free will go partly to making other people money, none of which I or all the others supporting this Forum will ever see. And I count everyone who gives freely of their valuable time and experience posting here as donators.
I think that those who wish to advertise here for anything they make a profit from, should be willing to donate a certain percentage of the procedes to the good of the LF community. I'm thinking one free seat a year to a worthy &/or poverty stricken applicant (travel/lodging excluded). Unless I see that sort of altruism from for-profit concerns, I'm going to feel a little taken advantage of every ime I see such an announcement.
If they aren't willing to 'pony up', they should content themselves with Tuan's Workshops page on the Home site. People who want to go to a workshop will be more apt to go shopping there anyway.
Tuan's site, Tuan's guidelines, Tuan's decision on whether or not to enforce them. Personally, if I were offering workshops, I'd post information about them on the Workshops page, not in what the link from Tuan's home page identifies as a "Questions and Answers forum."
I have considerable sympathy with Tom's position. The forum would not be here in it's present form had it not been for his hard and unpaid work.
The workshops page is the place for announcements like this.
I personally don't see the need to delete Michael's posting, although it's a very fine line with messages like this that refer on to commercial activity. He gets the benefit of the doubt from me, but only just this time!
Look two posts up the board above this one and you'll find Steve Simmons' "View Camera Conference" post. Not a single criticism about him posting that activity. He does state "the trade show is free" but does not tell that the rest of the conference is not free. He is certainly promoting a commercial endeavor. What gives? I truly do not understand why all the sniping at this post by Smith and not at the other one by Simmons. Both seem equally commercial to me. And what if someone announces that they have a show at Gallery X opening next week? There will be prints for sale, one would assume. Is that to be dissallowed as well? All three examples I give could be considered "commercial" in a strict sense but I think they are all perfectly appropriate for this board.
And if anyone is so bothered why not just NOT CLICK on the link if it says "workshop"
It must be "cabin fever". Ease up folks, Spring's coming!
There are good points being made on both sides of this issue. I think that these workshops do, in their way promote LF photography, and are definitely of interest to the participants of this forum. That being said, I agree with Tom that some gesture be made on the part of the beneficiaries of these workshops toward the not-for-profit nature of this forum. Further, if it is true that Michael's workshops are held in response to demand, and usually overfill, then there's really no need to announce them at all, and certainly not in an inappropriate forum. Good luck with your workshops Michael, I wish I could attend.
Maybe instead of each person offering a workshop starting a new thread, there should just be one thread for "workshop announcements" and all posts could go there. It's a little more work for the moderators in the short run to keep things in line, but reduces the clutter in the long run.
On the other hand, if someone starts a thread with a new workshop announcement, it might be generally interesting if, instead of having a conversation about the validity of the thread, past participants might say something about the workshop. After all, what if someone other than Michael started a thread about Michael and Paula's workshop with a pointer to their website, and asked if anyone had been to one, and what they thought of it? The commercial value to M&P would be the same, most likely, even if the intent of advertisement was absent, and something generally useful would come of it.
LF workshops not being high-profit endeavors, occasional announcements of this sort don't really bother me.
To those that feel that there should be some sort of reciprocity for the occasional notice of a workshop, how about some consideration of the fact that there are certain professionals that go above and beyond the call of duty to add a level of credibility to this forum with their willing participation in this forum. Certainly, Michael and Paula graciously qualify in this regard with a willingness to share their years of experience freely. My point is that there is a very large grey area on this subject for which as long as it does not get abusive, it should be allowed. Without people like Dick Arentz, Sandy King, Michael and Paula, Gordon Hutchings, Steve Simmons and many many others, those of us that are singluarly interested in broadening our understanding and execution of large format photography would be in a poorer knowledge position than we currently are now.
The reality of this situation is that nobody gets rich following this star so unless it gets real aggregious. my plea is to let it slide..........
I was not aware there is a separate "workshop listing" page. This is the only page I have ever been to on this site, and the headers at the top don't give a clue.
A good idea for the site would be a "what's happening" area for workshops, lectures, new books, articles, etc. I'm sure it would be viewed a lot, at least by those of us who want to know what is going on in the field.
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
Bookmarks